This copy is for your personal non-commercial use only. To order presentation-ready copies of Toronto Star content for distribution to colleagues, clients or customers, or inquire about permissions/licensing, please go to: www.TorontoStarReprints.com

'Flatlined' Hampton lashes out at media

With polls showing his campaign has &quot;flatlined,&quot; an angry NDP Leader Howard Hampton blasted the media yesterday for not covering what he believes are the real issues.

NDP Leader Howard Hampton talks to the media yesterday in Hamilton, where he lashed out at reporters. (JACQUES BOISSINOT / THE CANADIAN PRESS)

By Richard BrennanSTAFF REPORTER

Fri., Oct. 5, 2007

LONDON, Ont.–With polls showing his campaign has "flatlined," an angry NDP Leader Howard Hampton blasted the media yesterday for not covering what he believes are the real issues.

Hampton let loose after fielding yet another question having nothing to do with the campaign issues he considers most vital.

"We've become the child poverty capital of Canada – don't any of you people care?" Hampton railed at reporters gathered for a campaign event in NDP-friendly Hamilton.

He cited a Toronto Star report that said many Ontario nursing homes are being forced to violate the rights of the elderly, leaving them to languish for hours in urine-soaked diapers because they can't afford enough incontinence products for their residents.

"Don't you care that there are seniors living in soiled diapers? Don't you care about that? I'm asking you, `What do you care about?'

"That's what I know people care about. These are real issues."

Hampton pleaded with voters of all stripes not to give Premier Dalton McGuinty a "blank cheque" majority government that would let him "ignore the people" and break more promises.

In Brantford, the NDP Leader also blasted his Progressive Conservative counterpart, John Tory, for ignoring substantive issues and letting the campaign be dominated by his now watered-down promise to extend funding to faith-based schools.

"John Tory has been a disaster as an opposition leader, his faith-based school disaster has given Dalton McGuinty a free ride through the whole election," Hampton said.

"We've gone through a campaign that has felt like sleepwalking for three weeks and the issues that I think really matter to people have hardly gotten any attention."

With mere days left to Wednesday's election, the fired-up Hampton was whistle-stopping his way across southwestern Ontario.

In Ingersoll, he said voters – and reporters – should be paying attention to policies aimed at alleviating poverty and his pledge to immediately hike Ontario's minimum wage from $8 an hour to $10.

"I am saying that I am going to raise the issues that matter to working people and I am going to raise them especially hard over the next six days. I wonder if anybody is going to report on it?" he said.

"It's as if the media is on some sort of planetary exploration expedition." Hampton's meltdown in Hamilton was triggered by a CBC radio reporter asking if it was time for a new party leader.

"After the election I will talk to New Democrats about my future," said Hampton, who is running as leader in his third election.

In the 2003 election, the NDP lost party status and only got it back later through a by-election win.

John Wright, senior vice-president of polling firm Ipsos Reid, said both Hampton and Tory, who on Monday tried to defuse negative reaction to his school funding pledge by saying he would put it to a free vote of MPPs, are "desperate" because they know they're finished.

"This campaign was over on Monday afternoon and they know it. And that's why they are turning on the media," Wright said, adding that everything points to another Liberal majority government.

"If this is their response, it is a clear indication that their internal numbers haven't moved. Our ongoing polling shows the NDP has flatlined and, since the debate, the Tories have not been able to move their numbers.

"The finger pointing might make their supporters feel better but it doesn't get their numbers up," he said.

In Brantford, retiree Bryan Brush said maybe the media would cover Hampton more closely "if he had something interesting to say."

Standing at the sidelines of a news conference, he urged Hampton to spell out his position on the issues, rather than criticize his opponents.

"I would like to vote for the NDP, I don't trust either one of those guys ... the liar and the idiot, but he's (Hampton) got to come out here and tell somebody what he is going to do."

Tory, meanwhile, took Hampton's attack on him in stride.

"It does obviously mean that `HoJo' is over – you'll take due note of that," he said.

It was a reference to McGuinty's dismissive nickname for the Tory-Hampton tagteam that badgered him from both sides during the recent televised leaders' debate.

"Having said that, look, Mr. Hampton is frustrated, I'm frustrated, I have been frustrated," Tory said in Cobourg.

"But you carry on."

Expressing sympathy with Hampton's desire to focus more on substantive topics – and on McGuinty's "shameful record" in government – Tory said he hoped his policy shift on faith-based schools would ensure that other election issues are broached in the final days of the campaign.

More from the Toronto Star & Partners

LOADING

Copyright owned or licensed by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or distribution of this content is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Toronto Star Newspapers Limited and/or its licensors. To order copies of Toronto Star articles, please go to: www.TorontoStarReprints.com